In connection with such batching of items, items are used, which as regards various parameters essentially are within certain ranges, limits or tolerances, so that the supplied items all may be used for forming the desired batches. Thus, an initial sorting of the available items in consideration of one or more parameters may be necessary, which however necessitates undesirable costs and use of resources. Furthermore, it is apparent that as regards certain other parameters relatively large variation may be allowable. However, such an initial sorting of the available items may also have the purpose of identifying and removing items that are for example of a particular high quality and thus have a higher value, which items therefore are processed, e.g. handled, packaged etc, in another manner than the items, which are batched.
An initial sorting of meat products in consideration of desired characteristics is disclosed in e.g. WO 2006/086450 A1, incorporated herein by reference, which relates to a system and a method for sorting cuts of meat, where the meat products initially are sorted in two groups in accordance with threshold or range values for an attribute for the individual meat products. Subsequently, the meat products in each of the two groups are processed as groups.
Moreover, in connection with batching that is performed using one or more handling means of the robot type it may happen that a robot is not able to place a specific item in a desired manner on for example a packaging material, tray or the like, for example if the item is an e.g. oblong item, which is supplied with such an orientation, which requires that the robot has to turn the item a (relatively) large angle in order to be able to place the item in a desired manner, for example without protruding or overhanging the edge of the packaging material or without lying across the already placed items in the batch. Such a turning of the item may not be possible, depending on the robot equipment, or the actual turning of the item may possibly be too time-consuming, when it is desired or required to maintain an optimal work rate or working speed. Further, an item may be too large in general to be placed on or in the actual packaging material. Furthermore, when the batching must be performed with an optimal efficiency and work rate, an item, which otherwise fulfils the requirements and which can be used for the building-up of a specific batch, may pass the effective operating area for the robot(s), before the robot or the robots can manage to grip or pick the item, which item thus is out of reach. In order to avoid such incidents happening, the supply rate and/or the supply speed could be reduced, thereby reducing the total work rate or working speed and thus also the output rate, a solution which evidently is undesirable.
Thus, it is an object of the invention to provide an improved method and an improved system for performing such processing of items, where a batching is involved.
It is a further object of the invention to provide such a method and such a system, by means of which the processing of the items can be performed with consideration to the variation between the supplied items, which furthermore can be done without reducing the efficiency, and whereby the individual items can be utilized optimally.
Even further, it is an object of the invention to provide such a method and such a system, by means of which an initial sorting of the supplied items may be reduced or even dispensed with.
Furthermore, it is an object to achieve a higher degree of flexibility and automation in connection with such processes for batching of items.
These and other objectives are achieved by the invention as it will be explained in further detail in the following.